The hypothesis is in most cases yes, and most discussion is about the question how exactly, Springer, Wiley and the other publishing company can become available in the internet. But perhaps they were never invented for electronic publication? Let us make a simple example. Suppose, a classical printed journal was established in the 1970. This journal has a certain amount of readers (mostly libraries from all over the world), it has a certain authorship (professors from universities) and it has a business model which works. There is no need, that this newspaper is changing anything.
Sure, from a technical point of view it is possible to scan in all the old issues, it is possible to catalogize the articles in a bibtex database and even more, it is possible to run a SQL query against the database to get information about the productivity of the authors. But i would assume, that none of these idea will help the journal. In most cases, the journal is well working and the authors need no higher productivity.
Let us examine such of the techniques which are usually be discussed in the context of Open Science. The main idea is, to make academic writing transparent, to make the fulltext available for free, to open the science process for non-scientists and to increase the number of articles. To be honest: all of these goals contradicts the idea of a journal, founded in the 1970s. It is something which is different, and it is not possible to transform a journal into a new one.
The lesson is well known from the Brockhaus encyclopedia. Suppose, in the 1990s, one visionary thinker inside the Brockhaus encyclopedia would argue, that the company has to change everything which was done the last 100 years. Suppose, the employee argues, that Brockhaus become digital, that the work is done by anonymous authors distributed over the internet and all the content has to become free to read. Make it sense to realize such ambitious goals within the Brockhaus? No, the communcation friction would became to high. That means, explaining the old readers and members of the Brockhaus universe that everything what they have is wrong, and that the must learn everything new will not work. The better approach is to start from scratch outside of the old brockhaus, and this project is called wikipedia.
In my opinion the situation in the Open Access world is the same. It makes no sense to explain to classical publishers that they have to switch to online only, it is not the right choice, to explain classical authors, that nowadays their productivity is measured and it makes no sense to explain to the libraries, that it is no longer relevant to pay money for printed journals. In most cases, such arguments will not convince the other side, they are contradicting everything what the other is believing in.
The better approach is to start from scratch. This reduces communication friction. If a new academic journal is founded from scratch which is online-available for free from day 1, no one has to be convinced that this is a good idea. That means, the journal has no print history which is 50 years old, but starts with fresh ideas from the beginning.
I do not thing that OpenAccess and OpenScience is a development which is valid for every publisher. It is a criteria to separate between old publishing and new publishing. Both can exists together. The best perspective is, to let fans of printed journals and classical payed model are doing, what they have done the last 100 years. That means, to let the business of Elsevier and Springer unchanged, and at the same time start new academic journal for online-only and Open Science only purposes with a different approach. In such new invented journals the general attitude is internet oriented, the peer review is done openly, and productivity of the authors gets measured and modern technology is used as default. I do not see, that Open Access will replace the old model, I see only that there is a communication friction between people who like Open Access and people who don't.
The answer is not to negotiate about a shared future, the answer to work against each other. Like in the past, it is not possible to run Wikipedia from within the Brockhaus umbrella, because Brockhaus is to small for that plan. It is necessary to make a cut and start from scratch with a new company / organization.
Opposites
The main feature of Open Access is, that it is completely different from what's done the years before. Old school academic publishing works slow, in printed journals, with a small amount of authors, with a support by universities and for high prices. While the Open Access / Open Science is radical different. It is cheap, works with Internet technology, is open to everyone, and needs no library. The differences are too huge, to speak about a shared future. That means, there are more then detail question it is something which doesn't work together.
Open Access and classical publishing have not much in common. And it is not possible to argue pro Open Access to convince old publishers to change their mindset. It will not work, they will change nothing. The logical consequence is to give up. That means, it makes no sense to measure the productivity of the authors or to convince the people that using a mechanical typerwriter is out of date. The better alternative is to give up. That means, to let them working how they want and do not argue against printed journals.
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